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San Andres: ‘A Wonderful Place To Be’

FORT WORTH, Texas—The San Andres Formation on the Central Basin Platform of the Permian Basin has been commercially exploited vertically since the 1920s. Now, Elk Meadows Resources LLC and other privately held independents have begun exploiting the resource with horizontal wells.

“We started drilling in late 2014, and we’ve drilled six producing wells. We have majority control of 15 sections and 100% of it is operated,” said Terry Dobkins, president and CEO at Elk Meadows, speaking at Hart Energy’s recent DUG Permian Basin conference.

“We believe that we have about 90 more wells to drill, assuming one-mile laterals and drilling six wells per section; and then [Elk will] fall into what it considers an economic reservoir to work with. So, there’s a lot of drilling left to do.”

A number of factors attracted Elk Meadows to the play. There was a large area of historically proven production from the San Andres reservoirs, and early entrants had already demonstrated compelling economics.